My American Heart- March 9, 2005



Kent: If you guys just want to start out by saying your name and what you do in the band.
Steve: No you start.
Kent: Okay, Hi I'm Kent and I write for hatesomethingbeautiful.com
Jesse: Hi I'm Jesse and I play guitar.
Larry: I'm Larry, I'm the lead fuckin' gay singer.
Steve: Hey I'm Steve and I play drums.
Jeremy: I'm Jeremy, I'm really sick and I play guitar.

Kent: Can one of you tell me a little bit about the history of the band?
Larry: We've been together for like three and a half years, we started in a garage, we were a cover band. We covered "Larger Then Life" we were really shitty, but then we got really serious to play this show, this battle of the bands at Canes. We had a month to write five songs and we did it and we actually ended up winning out of 30 bands that were way older then us and played way longer then us.
Steve: Tell him how old we were.
Larry: And we were only like 15, so we were just really, really surprised and decided to take it a step further.

Kent: As of right now, you guys are without a bassist, correct?
Jesse: Um no, actually no we don't have a bassist but we have our buddy Keith from Iowa. He's like filling in for us for a while. It's nothing permanent so no one should get their hopes up or anything.
Steve: Uh same as that, Jesse was our bassist before. And if your thinking, "What are they going to do in the studio, they don't have a bassist" uh Jesse plays bass its all good.

Kent: So you guys just released your EP a little less then a year ago, and it seems like you guys keep getting more and more fans every day. What do you think has helped you the most in getting your music out there with no label?
Larry: You know, I mean its like we have so many friends and there's a lot of like...the internet!
Jesse: We have a big online base and that's how we got big off of like Purevolume and Myspace and pretty much just promoting online.
Steve: And because we're Asian (laughter).
Larry: No, anyways as I was explaining, the digital age is going crazy right now. Purevolume is crazy, that's why so many people listen to us, beucase if it wasn't for Purevolume, or MP3.com for that matter, back in the day, we wouldn't be anywhere right now. So that's how we get a lot of our exposure, and we have lots of friends from multipule various websites that always give a shout out.
Steve: And people read interviews
Larry: Yeah and all you nerds read the god damn internet.

Kent: So you guys are fans of people downloading your music then? Would you rather have someone download your album and come to the show and not buy the record then having them not hear about you?
Jesse: Oh, oh we're all for that dude.
Steve: I would rather have people download our music then buy one of our shirts or something.
Larry: You know what, I would rather people just download our fucking music. Dude I don't care about money, I just want you to listen to us.
Steve: You don't need to pay 8 bucks for a CD.
Larry: It'd be nice, we'd like you to. But I mean if you listen to our music, that's all we're really happy about.

Kent: Awesome. Well have you guys gone into the studio to record your new album?
Larry: Oh no, we actually go in right after this tour which ends the first week of April.

Kent: Have you guys written anything for it yet?
Larry: We've actually written about... well we have about 9 songs ready.
Jesse: We're hoping for 15 before we go in, but we're having preproduction and all that too.
Kent: So have you guys been writing any songs now on the road?
Jesse: Yeah, oh yeah.
Larry: Yeah, we never stop.

Kent: Okay, so you guys have been on the acoustic stage for the whole Taste of Chaos tour, how has that been going for you guys?
Larry: At first we were a little shaky about it because its an acoustic type deal you know, and we're not used to acoustic, you know. We had no idea what we were getting ourselves into. We were barely added, and very happy to be on Taste of Chaos. We didn't know they were serious about being acoustic. But what Kevin wanted to do with this stage was make it a little more intimate you know, and he did a pretty good job at it. Hopefully next year there will be bigger bands, bigger then My American Heart and Bleed the Dream.
Steve: By the way, we're all freezing right now, I can tell by your shaking hand
Kent: Yeah I know.
Steve: Everyone, he's shaking.

Kent: So I heard that you guys signed up for the contest in San Diego for TOC, but then Kevin decided to put you on the whole tour.
Jesse: Oh, well actually we didn't sign up for it, we had some friends that didn't think we were going to play the whole tour, and they asked their friends to vote for us, but we didn't really need the votes because we were already on the tour.
Larry: The funny thing is that we actually won, and we're actually on the whole thing so they had to choose another person, I think it's The Dead Giveaway.
Jesse: The Dead Giveaway.
Steve: Real 2 Reel Records, Real 2 Reel, San Diego local music!

Kent: Have you guys enjoyed slowing down your set and playing acoustic?
Larry: You know what I actually like about it is that everyone actually pays attention to my voice more then the music you know. And they actually get a chance to hear what I really sound like you know. Its stressing, but I love it.

Kent: You guys said before that you were going to be on Warped Tour, how long will you do that for?
Larry: The whole thing.
Kent: On the Smart Punk stage?
Larry: We're most likely going to play Ernie Ball. We have a good chance on Ernie Ball, but we are confirmed for the Warped Tour, it doesn't really matter where we're playing.

Kent: So are there any touring plans before Warped?
Larry: No, were just go into the studio.
Steve: We might.
Jesse: Yeah we might go out on the War Con Tour with 18 Visions and Bleed the Dream, but that's iffy, its not confirmed yet.

Kent: So you guys have been on the road for a while, do you have any good tour stories?
Steve: Can I tell you my crazy story?
Jesse: We had some fireworks on our last tour, that was nuts.
Larry: Dude, alright Steve shoots a fucking roman candle in some dude's fucking face (laughter), and the dude was so pissed off that he was drunk later and he fucking poured beer all over his head dude. It was so scary. He was so pissed off he got shot in the face with a roman candle.
Steve: Oh yeah, this is what happened. I shot my friend named Forrest, he played in a band called The Q. I shot him in the face with a roman candle, burnt his hair off. So after that everyone is on bad terms, but then like at the end of it, his revenge was he went into our trailer, and jacked off on our couch in our trailer. He busted one, just to get us back. So that's a real story, put that on there.
Jesse: But his band's broken up now.
Jeremy: We have a lot more crazy stories but we don't have a lot of time to tell them all.

Kent: I guess that's about it, do you guys have anything else to say to the readers at Hate Something Beautiful?
Jesse: Be prepared dude.
Larry: Check out our full-length coming out after the summer dude.
Kent: I'm sorry, do you guys have a label for the record?
Larry: You know, we're in talks right now. We're really close to singing, we're this close... to WarCon. Kevin Lyman's label.
Steve: Oh yeah, can I have a little announcement to the children out there. Everyone, start drinking more orange juice its really good for you, you won't get sick.
Larry: And water.
Jesse: Drink your vitamin C, take your Flintstones vitamins, and brush your teeth.
Jeremy: Airborne, there's good shit called Airborne. Its good for you.
Larry: Yeah dude like what it does is like, your immune system, it just makes it really strong so you don't really get sick that much.
Jeremy: Everybody uses it, and so should you.

Kent: Okay well thanks a lot guys.
Jesse: Yeah thank you.


Posted by Kent Bamberger on 4 Apr, 2005